Heir of Earth (Forgotten Gods) (23 page)

But it didn’t have to be like that for him. In Clonlea, Dayne was away from his family, out on his own and capable of living a normal life for once.

“That’s not true. What about Clonlea? You could have any life you wanted here, but instead you let everyone make up stories and spread lies about you. And you don’t even seem to care.” The moon had reappeared from behind the cloud by this point but he carried me, still. Which was fine by me!

“They’re going to think what they want to think regardless, and maybe I am the horrible person they say I am.” I couldn’t believe my ears. Dayne could never be horrible. Impossible, yes, but not horrible.

“You’re not horrible.” When I shook my head his hair brushed against my cheek, sending chills racing down my body. “I know you’re not.” Dayne turned sideways and we drew even closer together as we squeezed between two trees.

“You don’t really know me at all, Faye.” He looked over to the side, away from me as he said this.

“Yeah, I do. I know you were willing to step in and save me from that stranger at the festival, and I know you were the one who found me when I fell off Sterling. That’s not horrible, Dayne. That’s more than anyone else has done for me.” I studied the buttons on my shirt, shining glossy white in the moonlight, unable to believe I had found the nerve to tell him how I truly felt.

He didn’t say anything. We continued in silence, and I found myself listening to the crunch of his feet on the forest floor and hating every step. I knew each footfall took me closer to reality—away from Dayne and whatever new found understanding this was passing between us. Back to a world where I was nothing but a hired hand to him.

I found myself wanting to put my head on his shoulder and relax into the strength of him, knowing that I was safe and that nothing could ever happen to me as long as I was in his arms. I thought about the weird way he had reacted to me that day in his car. It seemed like secrets were being shared in the cover of darkness so I tried again.

“Dayne, what really happened when you found me in the woods that day?”

“What do you mean?” He asked as if we had never broached the subject before.

“My dreams. The ones I mentioned to you the other day? I know it isn’t all a dream.” I looked at his face and the loosened hair that hung down around it, highlighted in the glow of night. A branch brushed by his cheek and I reached out to knock it away.

“You’re talking about the stranger again?” He finally asked, knowing he couldn’t get away from me this time. I nodded.

“He wants to hurt me, doesn’t he?” I asked and shivered as I pictured the stranger’s ice-cold eyes. Dayne pulled me closer when the chill shook my body.

“He’s not going to hurt you.” He looked at me for the first time. A moment of silence wrapped around us as his words settled into my brain. An owl hooted from a high branch in a distant tree. I shook my head and we both knew that wasn’t the answer I was looking for.

“No…I’m asking if it really happened.” The instant the words left my lips I knew I didn’t want to hear the answer. If the stranger was real, the only way Dayne could promise he wouldn’t hurt me was if the part Dayne had played in my
dream
was real as well.

If dream-Dayne was real, the Dayne I knew in the real world wasn’t. The thought of losing him, even though I didn’t technically
have
him, sucked the air right out of my lungs.

“Would it change anything if it had?” His steps slowed and the crunching leaves beneath seemed to ring in my ears as his question sunk into my consciousness.

“No,” I whispered into the tiny space between us, knowing the answer without even thinking about his question.

It wouldn’t change anything if it weren’t a dream.

It wasn’t like I would tattle to the cops or Rose and Phin with news like that. I would sound like a raging lunatic, claiming such things were real. Probably be laughed all the way back to America, even in a town as superstitious as Clonlea. The only proof I really had was my vision of the stranger’s eyes. Trying to explain that would have signed my admission form at the crazy hospital. So letting any of what I suspected slip across my lips was big fat NO.

Accepting that day as truth certainly brought a whole new level of danger to my safe little world. Things like that didn’t happen anywhere but horror movies or really scary books. Which also meant that if it was real, that stranger wanted to hurt me.

But Dayne had just told me he wouldn’t, and I believed him. Maybe I was stupid to trust him so blindly. What couldn’t be ignored was Dayne’s uncanny ability to show up when I needed him the most—like getting lost in the woods, being all alone when Hannah went into labor, or facing certain death at the hands of a stranger. Besides, being with Dayne was the only place I felt totally safe. If I chose to run away from the truth, I would be running away from my only protection too.

Then, there was also the little issue of my heart. The irrational, uncontrollable passion of my first crush gave Dayne a power over me unlike anything I’d ever known. A power stronger than all the forces of the world put together. A force that would cause me to bury his secrets along with my own and protect us both. After all, who was I to judge someone for not being normal?

“Dayne, that’s not really an answer. You gotta give me something. I have to know…” The silvery trees began thinning ahead. Bright white light from the moon-drenched field peeked through the tangle of branches at the edge of the forest. For the first time that night, I hated to see the light.

“You know everything you need to know. You’re safe and nothing is ever going to hurt you.” He stopped a few feet from the edge of the forest. Light shone down on us from a hole in the canopy above.

He released me and I slid down the length of his chest. His arms still held closely around me, holding me against him even after my feet were firmly on the ground. Every protest that had sprung up in my mind faded away and the importance of knowing what had really happened that day in the woods no longer seemed to matter. I shivered against the cold.

He shrugged out of his jacket and draped it around my shoulders. His cool fingers tickled my skin as he reached around my neck to pull my hair out from beneath the warmth of his coat.

“Thanks.” I looked down and tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. To my amazement, his hand was already there. I watched his fingers stroke down the length of my curls that were illuminated to a platinum blonde in the moonshine.

He curled the ends of a few strands through his fingertips, just like he had in my dream the night Ali was born. I looked at him, disbelieving. A devilish grin revealed his impossibly white teeth and he bit at his bottom lip again, trying to keep his smile from widening. The night was growing weirder by the moment, but I was too distracted by him care.

His hand came up to my cheek, and he gently traced along my cheekbone with the back of his fingers. He continued down along the curve of my face and caught my chin between his thumb and forefinger. He tilted my head up so that it was aligned under his. My head hung back, exposing my neck to the moon’s soft light. I had no clue what he was doing, but I knew I didn’t want him to stop. His touch was soft as velvet on my skin.

His fingers continued down, across my throat, along my collarbone and came to rest on my chest, just above my heart. He closed his eyes, as if listening to the rhythm of my body. My heart began to beat heavy, loud and hard in my chest. The blood rushed through my veins and the black and silver contrast of the forest around me blurred and spun at the same time. I felt the vibration of his hand on my chest with every heartbeat, growing faster and deeper.

My strength failed me.

I couldn’t resist him any longer.

I threw my arms around his neck and leaned up on my tiptoes. My sudden movement broke his concentration and he looked back to my face. I seized the moment.

I had no clue what I was doing, but I had seen it in enough movies and read about it in enough books. I licked my lips and rubbed them together. Dayne’s mouth hung slightly open in shock, and I took advantage of it.

I planted my lips firmly over his, eyes shut, arms thrown around his neck and fingers twirled in his disheveled hair. I pulled my body as close to his as I could get and I waited.

I really didn’t know what to do next.

I stayed frozen, lips over his, and he did, too. I was beginning to think I was the world’s biggest fool. Why would Dayne want to kiss me?

I started to pull away in embarrassed defeat.

To my delight, he stopped me.

His strong arms circled around my waist, refusing to let my body leave his. He pulled back for a second, giving me a chance to stop him if I wanted to, and then his lips were on mine again, softly at first but then harder, urgently pressing into mine. Every part of me screamed, and I thought I might spontaneously combust from the fire he started in me.

My knees buckled under me, but it didn’t matter. Dayne held me against him, unwilling to let me go.

He kissed me until I couldn’t breathe.

Regrettably, I pulled away from his lips. His body remained curved into mine, his forehead resting against my cheek. My head went to the side, panting with the heavy breaths of oxygen-starved exhaustion.

“Faye,” he whispered heavily into my ear, out of breath himself. “I’m sorry. That didn’t need to happen.” He hung his head down, still holding me to him as if my touch were a comfort. I felt horribly guilty. I was the one who started this.

I had kissed him. I had thrown myself at him like everyone else. I wasn’t any different from all the other girls who lusted after him like a pack of starving dogs in a butcher shop.

I pushed out of his arms. “I’m sorry. That was my fault. I started it. I should have known you didn’t want that.” I turned away from him, unable to face his torment.

“Don’t,” he said. “I didn’t do anything to stop it.” He walked around and stood in front of me, taking my chin in his hand again. “Wanting and needing are two very different things, Faye. Of course I
wanted
to kiss you, but I didn’t
need
to kiss you.”

“Why?” It was the only word I could think of with his body so close to mine.

“I just can’t.” He dropped his chin and nodded toward the top of the field in front of us. “You’d better get back before they miss you.”

I turned to look at the field. The women still picked their way along the clumps of bushes, happy and contented in their search. I turned back to Dayne, but he was already gone. The leaves crunched under his footsteps in the forest. He wasn’t coming back.

“Rose! I am so sorry!” She was bending over picking a flower, just as she had been all night.

“Couldn’t find the comfrey? That’s okay. I know right where the bush is that I got that leaf from.” Rose wasn’t rattled in the least. She wasn’t searching the field frantically for me, calling my name like I was sure she would. It had to have been at least an hour since she left me on the cliff.

“Didn’t you miss me?” I was very confused.

“Sure?” Her answer was really a question. She looked up at me, trying to figure out what kind of game I was playing. A single primrose lay in her basket and she bent to pick another.

She hadn’t missed me at all. Was she that wrapped up in her herb picking? I looked across the field and saw April, still in the same spot, picking the same herbs. It was like time had stood still while I was with Dayne. Had I imagined him again?

I looked down at the basket that had somehow stayed with me through my adventure in the woods. Amazingly, every herb was still there.

“Um, Rose? Do you mind if I head back. I’m really tired.”

“Sure honey, you know the way? Wouldn’t want you getting lost. Your mother would never forgive me for that.”

I thought Rose and Phin would never leave the next morning. It was Saturday, so I had the day off. I declined Rose’s invitation to work at the bakery and Phin’s offer to join him at a real Irish football match. I yawned, and pretended to be exhausted from my late night of herb picking.

As soon as Phin’s truck was out of sight, I rushed up the stairs, jumping them two at a time in my haste. In my tiny bathroom I showered and toweled my hair dry. I dug through my bag and found the small zippered case that had not been pulled out since my arrival in Ireland. It contained everything a girl needed to primp—a small bottle of perfume, some mascara and tinted chap stick—the closest thing I had to lip-gloss.

After my barely there make up was carefully applied I stood in front of my closet trying to decide what to wear. I had to look casual, like this was what I wore all the time when I wasn’t in riding clothes.

I decided on a pair of jeans and a delicate white shirt with embroidery at the collar and sleeves, finished off with tiny pearl earrings. The necklace I always wore was now visible in the lower cut top, sparkling in the morning sunshine that poured through my tiny eastern window. I pulled on leather cowboy boots and strung a belt through the loops at my waist.

Standing in front of the mirror, I nodded my head approvingly. Not too bad. My days of working in the sunshine had tanned my skin just slightly. My hair, free to curl how it wanted, no longer restricted by the rubber band, flowed in a golden veil.

I grabbed Dayne’s jacket from the post on my headboard where it rested all night, and in my excited haste, it slipped from my grasp. As it landed on the well-worn wooden floor something clattered from the pocket and skittered under my bed. Down on my hands and knees to retrieve it, I saw it was a key on a long chain. Turning it over in my hand, using the bright sunlight to get a better look, my face drew together in a puzzled way.

Dayne always wore a large ring of rusty keys hooked on his belt, but I had never noticed one like this. It was a dainty, feminine key. Gold scrollwork circled around the shaft and head of the skeleton key. A clear glass bead gleamed in the center of the head, right where you would get a grip on it to turn a lock. I dropped it back in the pocket as I slung the jacket around me. It wasn’t cold enough to need the jacket, but I wanted to wear it anyway.

It was a 10-minute walk to Ennishlough, and I could think about nothing but last night as I skipped around the mud puddles. I couldn’t wait to see him. He had kissed me. He had wanted me last night. Just like a drug addict, I had my first taste and I wanted more.

I was halfway up the drive when I met Lucas, heading home after the morning feeding.

“Hey! Wow. You look awesome.” He couldn’t take his eyes off of my hair as he spoke to me. “Where were you last night? I looked for you.”

“Hey. Um, I was there.” I said suddenly nervous about possibly having to answer questions about where I had really been last night. “I ended up leaving early. I was tired.” Not a total lie.

“Oh,” he said looking at me, sensing the tension in my voice. “Oh.” His tone was different when he noticed the huge jacket that hung down to my knees. “I see.” His arms crossed in front of his chest and his soft look of welcome changed to a hard look of betrayal. He saw Dayne wear the jacket everyday just like I did.

“Lucas, it’s not like that.” Total lie.

“Hey, that’s fine. If that’s what you want.” He kicked at the ground with the toe of his boot. “Just don’t expect to be any different than all the others.” I could tell he was hurt and trying to cut me just as deeply.

“Lucas.” I wanted to tell him he was wrong, that he was way off base, make this as easy as possible, but I didn’t want to lie to him anymore so I said nothing.

“Whatever, Faye.” He stormed off down the driveway, picking up a rock and throwing it into the field as hard as he could.

My heart leapt when I walked into the barn and saw LeSheen standing in the cross ties, fully tacked up. I quickly forgot about my encounter with Lucas.

I walked over to LeSheen, who pinned his ears back in the universal horse sign of
un
welcome.
Stupid horse,
 I thought. Dayne was sitting on an overturned bucket in the stall bedside him, reclined against the wall. Legs sprawled in front of him, his focus remained on his hands as he rubbed a palm with his thumb, deep in thought. I stopped in my tracks and watched him for a moment.

He was so effortlessly gorgeous that I immediately felt totally unworthy of him and everything that had happened between us last night. I traced my lips, remembering the feel of his moonlight kiss. I wasn’t making it up this time. He had wanted me.

I cleared my throat, not knowing what to say. He glanced up for a second and then down at his hands again. His silence was excruciating.

“I brought your jacket back.” My comment was easy and harmless. I shrugged out of the coat and hung it on a nail.

He looked older in the daylight, worn and ragged like he hadn’t slept all night.

“Faye.” It was fast and hard, like he couldn’t spit it out of his mouth fast enough. “You need to forget about last night. That never should have happened.” His nose and lips curled away from his face, disgusted at the memory of us.

The words punched at my insides, knocking the wind from my lungs. I felt the life drain out of me, pooling around my feet, holding me frozen in place. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t think.

“But.” The voice did not sound like my own. It sounded like a scared little girl and the familiar sting of rejection that had followed me through high school burned at my ears.

I felt like an idiot standing there before him in my carefully chosen outfit. The mascara and chap stick I had so lightly applied felt like clown make up now. My hair—
My stupid hair!
—he had stroked so tenderly last night now felt like a dunce cap on my head.

Just don’t expect to be any different from the others.

Lucas’ words screamed in my ear. I wanted to hide, to shrink away into a safe dark corner and then leave forever, never seeing him again, never being reminded of my colossal mistake again.

He walked past me, leading LeSheen from the barn. He didn’t even look at me. I stared at the empty wash rack. Defeated. Deflated.

The clip-clop of LeSheen’s hooves on the stone aisle suddenly enraged and unnerved me. I wasn’t going to let him do this to me. I wasn’t going to let him make me feel like a fool. He had kissed me back last night.

I spun furiously on my heel and followed him out of the barn, my teeth grinding, my blood boiling as soon as my eyes landed on his back.

Dayne swung effortlessly into the saddle and began to trot off.

My jaw clenched. My eyes squinted and a fury I had never known before pounded through me. I felt like I was about to explode. All the hurt and pain I had swallowed in my life bubbled up to the surface and turned to pure hatred laser focused at them.

LeSheen moved further away from me, but it wasn’t fast enough. If I had held something I would have thrown it at Dayne’s arrogant head. My hands formed into fists and dug into my thighs.

Go on! Leave! I never want to see you and your stupid horse again!
I screamed in my mind.

My body buzzed like a hive of angry bees and shook with the ferocity of my anger. I wished I could push them away, so far from me I never had to see him again.

A strong wind kicked up out of nowhere. It blew furiously at my back, spilling my hair over my shoulders and flying wildly through the air around me. The gust moved toward them, picking up pieces of hay and dust as it went.

I knew the instant it reached the massive white stallion trotting away. The hairs of his tail flattened out to the side and pushed between his hind legs. The breeze was a full-force gale by the time it reached Dayne’s back, pushing him forward in the saddle, blowing his collar straight up around his neck and scattering his mahogany hair.

It pleased my anger to see them pushed away from me.
Get out of here you jerk! Take that stupid horse with you!
I thought.

They stopped immediately. My anger checked itself slightly. Had I actually screamed those words out loud?

Together they turned and stared at me. Both horse and man looked at me with a mix of fear and shock on their faces. LeSheen snorted like horses do when they pick up the smell of danger on the wind.

My eyes locked on Dayne’s. The wind fell away. I glared at him, hoping the hatred I felt was plain on my face.

Satisfied I had made my point, I turned and walked back into the barn. I knew it was childish, but I couldn’t resist knocking his stupid coat to the dirty floor as I stormed away.